Sophie's pls

Vol #205: December 5th, 2024

It’s time for lunch.

Sharing a meal is a universal experience that humbles everyone around the same table. Square tables have heads, and you can land in Siberia around too big of a circle, but here, we all break bread.

When you want to get to know someone, you take them out for a meal. Even the simple act of buying a cup of coffee shares the intimacy of selection followed by the mutual restoration of spirits. You have something to talk about.

A drink counts, but only for partial credit. While the reduced inhibitions can be a social lubricant, there is truly nothing more universal than sharing food. Besides, even with Ceres across the block, it’s been twenty years since you could slip a rum and coke onto the trading floor.

My first experience with a lunch run came on my second day on the floor. Day one you fill out HR papers and get a tour, day two it’s time to get your hands dirty. Clerks still outnumbered traders, because there was still a lot of manual work to be done - running tickets, clearing breaks. Not the least of which was getting lunch.

At 11am on the AMEX floor, YKS was hungry. “sophies pls” hit the NY-Office chat. Barely knowing one pit from another, I quickly scrambled down to the dead center of the floor, and found my guy mostly by the color of his jacket. “You know where Sophie’s is?” he asked incredulously.

I didn’t know then, but their Cuban sandwich was to die for. “Cuban, extra green sauce” was all I had to work with, and carefully slipped the $20 bill next to the empty pack of smokes someone left in the mesh pocket.

Things went awry as soon as I got the question “platter or sandwich?” Not wanting to hold up the line behind me, I figured platter. Go big or go home. Wrong.

I’d spent less than 3 hours on the floor and already ticked off the head of the training program. “What is this?” “Uhh, don’t worry, I’ll take care of it, uhh, I’ll get you another, uhh, I’ll eat this.”

Call to the booth. “Frank, take care of your boy.”

I’d like to say that was the last lunch run I ever messed up, but I’m sure there were others. Whether it was juggling salads from World Cafe with 5 different toppings, or just taking too long for the steak sandwich at Tajin, fetching lunch felt thankless, but you had to relish this window of opportunity.

Handling a lunch order correctly was how you won the respect of senior traders, and got a peek behind the scenes at how to be successful in this game.

The first order lessons are fairly obvious. Remember the tomato, cucumber, feta, *red* onions AND olives. Wally hates ketchup. Count the change correctly. Bonus points if you suggest something good and are willing to head into the west loop for Nando’s chicken.

While there is something to be said for not succeeding at jobs you don’t want, failing to do a simple task is a red flag. The glamorous parts of trading happen after you get the bonus. A person who thinks they’re above grunt work is likely to bend when the going inevitably gets tough.

The parable of the jade master from Ed Seykota is one I often reference in learning about trading. A frustrated apprentice is repeatedly told to sweep the floor, while his master waxes on about love and war; politics. After months of this he confronts the senior, who hands him a stone which he is able to reflexively tell is not true jade.

What you really earn with a successful lunch run is a seat at the table, or at least standing room over someone’s shoulder. Trading is a craft as much as it’s a skill, and the best way to gain experience is through exposure, and soaking up the lessons of others.

While classes can teach you the arithmetic of reversals and conversions, and mock trading will sharpen mental math, there is no workbook that can truly tell you how to trade. Every master has their own technique and process, which is not easily communicated into simple commandments.

Walking into a pit with a freshly made sandwich will ingratiate you with the host. Food satisfies a primal need. It’s a wide open door for you to enter into a closely guarded domain. Even better if you both like salami provolone.

Food had to come to the pits, because the traders can’t go out and get it. Before app delivery everywhere, this meant trading firms had their own in house service. No one wants to miss a trade and spend $10,000 on a burrito.

Delivering lunch was far better than an update on the Bad Trade Analysis that you just did. No one says “hey look at this funny thing happening in ZYX stock” after you just reminded them about this morning’s pick off. Keep feeding someone, and maybe you’ll get a chance in the hot seat while they stretch their legs on a slow day.

When you get a chance to stop by a different trader every day, you start to appreciate how they see the world differently. If you’re lucky a different guy is talking about the same order when you get to his burrito. There’s no right answer other than finding a way that works for you.

The lunch run is quickly becoming antiquated. Floors are now a specific game, and no longer do shops run their whole operation out of a 4x12 booth. Sole props are all but gone, and teams of traders tackle opportunities collectively so there’s always someone on the desk. Now you can go for that delta walk to calm down before forcing a hedge.

Lunch runs sound like hazing, but they’re closer to a golden ticket. No matter how technically skilled you are, there’s nothing like the fat of a sandwich to cut the acid of a tough market. It’s a opportunity that delivers every day.